Saturday, May 07, 2011

EU countries have agreed to impose a travel ban and asset freeze on 13 high-level Syrian regime members. Busines tycoon Rami Makhlouf is on the list, but President Bashar al-Assad is off the hook for now.

The sanctions package also includes an embargo on sales of weapons and equipment which could be used for internal repression and is due to legally enter into force on 10 May.

From the position of actually knowing something about the world, French FM Alain Juppe snorted in reply through a source:

He noted "the chance is very small" that the current set of sanctions will make al-Assad change track.

Effectiveness is not an option. This is about looking like you’re trying, or at least trying to look like they’ve distanced themselves away from a virtual crony.

Out of a batch of of 81 dead bodies brought to the Tishreen Military Hospital in Damascus in recent days "most of them [had been] killed by a gunshot bullet to the back. It is strongly suspected that these soldiers have been killed for their refusal to shoot civilians."

You're probably familiar with the expression "Ugly American," a pejorative and stereotypical term for US expatriates who alienate the locals with their loud and disrespectful behaviour

muses Maria Foley, a Canadian repatriate who proposes retiring the expression "Ugly American" (a pejorative and stereotypical term for US expatriates who alienate the locals), and suggests replacing it with Ugly Expat.

It comes from the 1958 book The Ugly American, a cautionary tale that tells the story of corrupt and ethnocentric American bureaucrats in Southeast Asia.

One of the characters in the book characterizes Ugly Americans like this:

"A mysterious change seems to come over Americans when they go to a foreign land. They isolate themselves socially. They live pretentiously. They're loud and ostentatious."

Ugliness: it's not just for Americans anymore

This being the age of globalization, it seems unfair to single out Americans as the champions of boorish behaviour abroad. In the spirit of inclusiveness, I'd like to propose we retire the expression Ugly American and replace it with Ugly Expat. Cultural disrespect is an equal opportunity sport, after all — one the entire world is eager to play.

Not all Ugly Expats are arrogant and ignorant (although that's the most dangerous combination); some give off the ugly vibe because they're paralyzed by fear and unsure of how to behave. Some merely lack the ability to translate their good intentions into culturally-appropriate actions.

You, too, can be an Ugly Expat!

Some expats come by their ugliness naturally. For those who have to work at it, here's a handy 12-step programme. I've tested out a couple of these myself (all in the name of research, of course!) and can pretty much guarantee their effectiveness. If you start at #1 and repeat as needed, you'll be an Ugly Expat in no time.

Friday, May 06, 2011

How often have you heard that conservatives, that Tea Partiers, that capitalists, that inhabitants of the American heartland are the equivalent of fascists, of neo-fascists, of extremists from the far right as embodied by European parties like France's Front National?

As usual, when confronted with facts, the narrative comes up wanting… Very wanting.

Marine Le Pen sums it up in one sentence when the New York Times's Russell Shorto "pointed out [to her] that in the U.S. she would sound like a left-wing politician". She shot back that "Obama is way to the right of us”!

[Marine Le Pen] has come out with a detailed critique of capitalism and a position promoting the state as the protector of ordinary people. “For a long time, the National Front upheld the idea that the state always does things more expensively and less well than the private sector,” she told me. “But I’m convinced that’s not true. The reason is the inevitable quest for profitability, which is inherent in the private sector. There are certain domains which are so vital to the well-being of citizens that they must at all costs be kept out of the private sector and the law of supply and demand.” The government, therefore, should be entrusted with health care, education, transportation, banking and energy.

Inside the New York Times Magazine, Russell Shorto has an in-depth portrait of France's (Kinder, Gentler) Extremist, whose economics are "frankly leftist" and whose "economic stance is drawing interest from the left as well as the right": "When I pointed out that in the U.S. she would sound like a left-wing politician, [Marine Le Pen] shot back, “Yes, but Obama is way to the right of us,” and opined that proper government oversight would have averted the American financial crisis." Mainstream parties across Europe "have not found answers to this pan-European movement," adds the director of the John Adams Institute in Amsterdam, "for which the term “far right” seems increasingly inadequate."

…Sarkozy’s recent and highly visible use of the French military has given Le Pen another opening to exploit. She is opposed to his involvements in Libya and Ivory Coast and to globalist enterprises in general; she sees the uprisings in the Middle East to be partly a result of “policies put into place by the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization toward an impoverishment of the North African countries.” Sarkozy’s aligning France with NATO might win support in the White House and 10 Downing Street, but it has done little for his popularity at home. For the country’s disaffected, it only reinforces views of him as an elitist and a globalist. Where in the United States many of the disaffected might look to a return to Christian and free-market values, their counterparts in Europe find comfort in a turn toward nationalism, which includes state protection, and away from the institutions of globalization. Le Pen is locked into that mind-set.

EUranus’ Orbit: apparently being able to potentially corral 27 votes in the UN General Assembly, and 2 votes on the UN Security Council by law isn’t enough, even for nations who do virtually nothing substantive for the world, other than peddling arms.

"It's a diplomatic success. But it doesn't change the events on the ground, which are still going in a very bad direction," one EU diplomatic contact said.

"Even those countries dragging their feet, like Cyprus, agreed that something had to be done for the EU to remain credible," another diplomatic contact said.

"There is no talk of military intervention at all. The Libya option is not on the table," the source added

How apparently thoughtful looking, but the problem is that there are no Americans that will not be doing any of that killing people and breaking things stuff that they’re too anemic to use as a threat with a “sanctionee.” Even if they did, what do you want to bet that the Germans would shoot it down on the pretext that it’s all just happening to quickly to allow for comprehensive analysis, such as this:

1.26.2011, Hasan Ali Akleh imolates self, protests against the state kick of with a bang. Many in fact.

From Jerusalem, one reader of the International Herald Tribune compares Osama Bin Laden to Adolf Eichmann. Although I don't agree with Hana Senesh's "greater moral victory" stance in the first paragraph, the rest of the letter is interesting:

Regarding the killing of Osama Bin Laden: I think there would have been a greater moral victory had this arch terrorist been captured alive, interrogated for intelligence purposes and then put in an orange jumpsuit and handcuffs, and placed on trial, instead of being granted the martyr’s death he craved.

Israel awoke with the news of Bin Laden’s death on Holocaust memorial day. The Jewish people suffered the equivalent of a 9/11 every day for over five years during the Holocaust. Fifteen years after the end of World War II, Israel captured Adolf Eichmann, one of the chief architects of the Holocaust. He is the only person ever executed on conviction by a civilian court in Israel, which is too often portrayed as the worst of nations.

Nowadays, Israel faces a threat from Palestinian terrorism, which has killed a far higher percentage of Israeli citizens than the percentage of Americans who were killed on 9/11. I hope that America will support Israel if it manages to eliminate its own Osama bin Ladens.

Wednesday, May 04, 2011

Walter Ulbricht, the Stalin of East Germany and Architect of the Berlin Wall resigned Monday as head of the Communist party because of age. He is 77. In east Berlin, antoher headliner, Erich Honecker, 58, was named to succeed Ulbricht as first secretary. Ulbricht is the senior Communist party leader in the Soviet Bloc.

Europe can adulate about the US offing bin Laden, and join in “declarations” now that it’s been done. The sudden absence of “nuance” is no longer necessary to avoid the need to act – besides, the world would notice.

"The United States fought alone and so they are under no obligation to share with anyone the laurels of tracking down and eliminating bin Laden. Congratulations, America. The DNA of the world’s greatest power is intact. The dollar is faring poorly and the fiscal situation is tense, but the military itself is in great shape. If Germany produces the best cars and China the cheapest Santas in the world, when it comes to security the United States are world export champions. Certainly, security is a product that is horribly expensive and that does not always look pretty, but its machinery is well oiled."

Europeans “getting some laurels” being the only thought connected with the news of others’ actions. We still find a rare moment of lucid reflection nonetheless:

“The American victory must make us Europeans rejoice – and hang our heads in shame at the same time. Our continent, whose population and economic strength are comparable to those of the United States, obviously has no desire to defend its values, its prosperity, or even itself. Most Europeans – because the Germans are not alone in this case – refuse to understand the nature of this struggle against international terrorism, which has gone on for ten years now. This war is not a war like the ones in our history books. There was no declaration of war, and there will never be an act of capitulation. The enemy wears no helmet, nor uniform, and he would find it hard to drive a tank without causing an accident. In the morning he hangs a belt of explosives around his waist and heads for the market nearest his home. This war cannot be won, and yet it cannot be lost.

Inasmuch as Germany could be “denazified”, he is wrong. It can be won. And he doesn't have to work for a Reichsnachrichtdienst or somesuch for exactly the same reason. A good rule of thumb is to not expect enough lucidity for it to actually matter.

Our ignorance of this war is the best accomplice of terrorism."

Hardly. Ignorance implies something innocent about the way they carried on for the past decade. They understood completely that a guarantee of their near complete inaction required a well structured and formulated intellectual construct to be presented, not to mention the loudest wave of obfuscation and evasion that they could muster.

when President Barack Obama presents the Medal of Freedom, the United States’ highest civilian distinction, to Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Just what do you say at a state dinner honoring the leader of an allied country that, against the instincts and commitments of France, Britain and America, declined to vote in favor of a U.N. Security Council resolution to protect Libyan civilians in rebellion against the dictatorship of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi?

In February, before the Libyan uprising, the German U.N. abstention, and the allies’ efforts at interdiction, praising Mrs. Merkel’s embrace of liberty didn’t present a problem. Handing out the freedom medals for 2010 — Mrs. Merkel could not attend the event — Mr. Obama chose to quote her: “Freedom does not come about by itself. It has to be struggled for, and then defended anew, every day of our lives.”

Next month, the easy diplomatic course might be to toast Germany’s great democracy, its economic prowess and to let the rest lie — without any reference to a German strategic choice seemingly inspired by the government’s fear of the effect of Libyan intervention on a series of important regional elections this year.

But Mr. Obama’s dilemma is real. The postwar Germans, to their immense credit, are usually their own harshest critics. Should the president listen to them these days, some leading voices are becoming increasingly insistent in portraying the Merkel government’s inaction as a disaster.

Last week, Lothar Rühl, a former high-level Defense Ministry official, said Germany was now regarded in NATO as a “second-class” player

Oh, and for those of you who thought, who predicted — who knew! — that Barack Obama's replacement of George W Bush in the Oval Office would usher in a new golden era of mutual understanding and productive diplomacy, John Vinocur (who wrote about Germany's "hysterical" reactions a month ago) has this:

some Americans have heard complaints from Germans that they were insufficiently consulted as the Obama administration weighed — and hesitated, and then measured out — its military involvement.

Ach ja. Plus ça change… Read the entire original article, also to see how, in the final paragraph, John Vinocur manages to bring John Cleese and Fawlty Towers into the equation. As for us, we will let Kurt Volker, who served the Bush and Obama administrations as ambassador to NATO, have the final word:

As for Germany, Mr. Volker did admit to some surprise: “It didn’t do what Germany normally does — say ‘yes,’ and then not do much of anything.”

What we know about the operation to kill Bin Laden is that it was many years in the making and that key breaks came in 2007 and before from information extracted from captured terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay. But this is precisely the sort of thing President Obama spent his campaign and the first two years of his presidency condemning.

Jack Wakeland sent me a note insisting that Obama does deserve credit for ordering a special forces raid deep inside Pakistani territory, without Pakistan's permission. But he then points out that,

After deriding George W. Bush's military policies as having an aspect of unilateral aggression and his anti-terrorism policies as being violations of international law, Barack Obama decided to adopt (second-hand) nearly every one of them. He should get very, very little credit for doing so.

So you would think a little humility might be in order. At the very least, Obama might have obliquely shared credit for this raid with the previous administration. Instead, he tried to steal all of the credit, and not just from the Bush administration, but also from dedicated military and intelligence professionals who have worked for years, across administrations, to win this victory.

For example, Obama began his description of the operation by saying that

shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda.

This is laughable. Does he really think anyone needed his orders to do that? Does he really expect us to believe that George W. Bush wouldn't have given his right arm to bring Bin Laden to justice before he left office? Does he expect us to believe that there were not already dozens, hundreds, thousands of people already working toward that goal over a period of years, as we now know they were?

But he goes on, emphasizing and inflating his own role: "I met repeatedly with my national security team," and "I determined that we had enough intelligence." Methinks he doth protest too much. This is the kind of situation in which a confident leader, one who is certain of his record of decisiveness and determination, would de-emphasize his own role and emphasize the role of the professionals, knowing that he doesn't have to tout his own leadership. But the fact that Obama does repeatedly tout it tells us that he is desperate to be seen to be bold and decisive, so he is milking this event for all it's worth. He has to milk it because he's got nothing else.

Leadership is not a matter of one-off special forces raids. George Bush didn't win the war in Iraq because our troops killed insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in mid-2006. He won it by orchestrating the "surge" in early 2007. But if we look at everything else in Obama's foreign policy, there are no other grounds for reassurance.

At least someone in the “we think, you don’t”arteest community was willing to admit that they believe bin Laden was behind 9-11. From Netherlands’ jazzless and lecturesome RNW:

On Monday morning, the programme, De Wereld Draait Door, commissioned one of the Netherlands' most well-known musicians, Theo Loevendie, and one of the country's leading authors, Abdelkader Benali, to compose an operetta about the death of the al Qaeda mastermind. The duo managed to create the 90-second operetta, "Report about a Death Foretold", in less than 10 hours.

Imagine if a top American historian appeared on the MSM insisting that the only reason Europeans conquered the Americas was to "defend" the Native Americans--who somehow had adopted Christianity centuries before Jesus was born--from being persecuted by heathen tribes.

In te4h process of constructing a rationalization for the cruelty of the mobs that “the scholars” incite, they come up with generally elementary implausible nonsense, such as the idea that the Copts should be “liberated” through coercion and violence, but that it’s okay because deep down they’re really not Christians. Deep down they were muslims before Muhammad.

Consider the case of Fadel Soliman, a celebrated Sharia expert and Arab media darling, who regularly appears on al-Jazeera. Director of the Bridges Foundation--which teaches Muslims "how to present Islam" to non-Muslims--Soliman also lectures at Western universities, churches, and governmental agencies, including the U.S. Dept. of Defense.

His new Arabic book, Copts: Muslims Before Muhammad, asserts that, at the time of the Muslim conquest of Egypt (c. 640), the vast majority of Egyptians were not, as history has long taught, Christians, but rather prototypical Muslims, or muwahidin, who were actually being oppressed by Christians: hence, the Muslim conquest of Egypt was really about "liberating" fellow Muslims. Soliman's evidence is that the Arian sect, which rejected the claim that Jesus was coequal with God, was present in 4th century Egypt. Therefore, according to Soliman, the indigenous Egyptians were practicing Islam hundreds of years before it was founded in the 7th century.

In fact half of the original muslims of Muhammed’s time were converted from Judaism. Were THAT magically somehow Muslims before that happened?

The question remains: Are Islam's apologists disingenuous or deluded? When it comes to "bridge-building" Soliman--who provides "sensitivity training" to the FBI and Pentagon--one is inclined to answer in the former: his book contains academic crimes, including flagrant mistranslations to support his thesis and wild, but undocumented, assertions (for example, that the Arians, like the Muslims, used to proclaim "There is no god but Allah and Jesus is his prophet").

Of course. They did it all the time. I just did it on Sunday. After all “Allah” translated, if God. Not necessarily one that the most ignorant Muslims think that they have a monopoly on.

You read that correctly: Incredibly, Ricardo Gama survived — and has even returned to blogging (his first video after returning from the hospital is here) in spite of the (quite visible) bullet wounds to his head.

And if you think the assassination attempt has cooled him down, take a look at him and listen to his voice in the video below (even if you don't understand Portuguese, watch the first 45 seconds as Ricardo's defiance cries out and as he presents some of his wounds to the camera): Ricardo looks — and sounds — mad as hell…(If you watch eithervideo on YouTube's website, don't forget to "Like" the video(s)…)

Monday, May 02, 2011

Naturally enough, Le Monde's front page is devoted to the fate of Osama Bin Laden at the hands of America's special-op forces (Bottom of this post: The full-body portrait from which Le Monde's front page headshot was cropped).

But, as usual, Plantu manages to muddy America's image by suggesting not only that the head of Al Qaeda was the target of a vulgar assassination attempt but he does so in a cartoon that recalls the infamous Eddie Adams photo of a Viet Cong prisoner — bound, helpless, and incapable of defending himself — being shot point blank in the head by an (ally of the) American(s) without having had the benefit of a trial beforehand.

In the cartoon, one sees the slug coming out the other side of the victim's head — just like in the Pulitzer prize-winning photo, when examined carefully. Although the circumstances have to some extent vindicated Brigadier General Nguyen Ngoc Loan (as the captain of a terrorist squad during the Tet offensive, the captive had wiped out the family of one of the police chief's deputy commanders), the shot (sic) is still regarded (certainly by the mainstream-media-fed public) as the uncalled-for assassination of a harmless prisoner and as (allegedly) depicting the concomitant heinous, barbaric, fascistic (etc, etc) behavior of an evil imperialist, colonialist Western government (and of its local allies, the traitorous, collaborative, and human rights-deficient poodles) arraigned against the resistance of brave Che Guevara-like freedom fighters.

Between 300 and 500 European soldiers of fortune, including EU nationals, are working for Colonel Gaddafi in Libya, a leading criminologist has said.

The European mercenaries are mostly specialists in heavy weapons, helicopter technology and tactics and command fees of several thousand US dollars a day. The majority come from Belarus, Serbia and Ukraine. There is a significant amount of Polish helicopter experts. Belgian, British, French and Greek nationals are also involved.

But it’s never too late for a little bit of de minimus style ass covering.

He added: "The definition of 'mercenary' is also an issue. What you more often have is individuals who are involved in selling weapons and then providing a bit of advice and training before disappearing."

Really? That’s all? At least they’re working on behalf of a UN member, one that used to be on the UN Human Rights Council.

As for being a bunch of pompous marxist unarmed pansies – I take all of that back now. All of it except for the part about the spinning moral compass and the joy they take in lecturing non-Europeans while ignoring their own, obscenely long legacy of vacationing in Biafra.

Is this the kind of day that would make Palestinians in the West Bank hand out baklava in the streets and honk their horns, perhaps? Expect people to tch-tch at the idea of Americans out on the streets in the middle of the night in DC and NY needs to look at their age: this has been THEIR GENERATION’S war, and killing bin Laden is a sign of victory in their war. In large part, the people you saw in those pictures are GWU and NYU students.

If you think that they aren’t entitled to their moment, then check your humanity and ask yourself why you don’t react the same way when you see Palestinians celebrating when civilians are murdered, instead of a filthy savage like bin Laden.

Expect the minimizers to lurk out of the woodwork within hours.

Aside from that, a quick scan of RT and Radio Moscow reveal their “new reporting” to amount to little more that reporting the nature of the Kremlin’s press announcement. Proving to be nothing more than organs of state, they are likely waiting to be told what to say about the killing of bin Laden.

Update 1: Disconnected and protected from the big bad outside world, we can see a typical German reaction in comment Numero Uno within minutes of the report:

It’s bad enough that it went on this long, hunting for a man for over 10 years.Of course, it is clear that if he falls into the hands of American intelligence or the Mossad, he would die.

The American people, which then goes out to the streets and cheered is quite scary.There was a reason to celebrate it since September 11, not once.War, another terrorist who is not with the death of Bin Laden over!

... It is an indisputable proof that a large part of the American people are stupid, stupid, ignorant and manipulated.

In Germany, no one would ever think about it if a long-sought after criminal is killed. And that despite many people in this country having a very low level of education and nonetheless prefer a political resolution.What this says about these disgusting patriotic U.S. Americans need not be discuss them further. A serious and dangerous country!

No American is suggesting that it's over now. This guy is doing the usual thing: wishing the world to be the way he wants, wishing people (particularly "VS Amerikanern") to be who he wants them to be, and so forth. Pretty predicatable stuff.

Further down, it’s a freeforall from the “Ja, ja, logich, undsoweiter...” school of cheap thought:

I'm not surprised because the United States itself has thought up everything (about Bin Laden) and I will not be surprised if Obama soon dies.!

Because those awful Amis made the whole thing up about al Queda, and what’s more, her imaginary invisible force will knock off the President for doing the bidding of that “mysterious force”.

And this from a some manboy who prefers a policy of cowering:

USA? Are they stupid?They snatched him, perhaps for the first time, and immediately kill him. The U.S. will regret the murder might have ... If the next attack comes: (

”Murder”. I wonder if he ever thinks of the 9/11 attacks in terms of “murder”. Probably not, given his further response:

usa ist kacka

His sophistication is inspiring. Otherwise, may we “question the timing” of these tediously predictable reflexive reactions?

The Washington Post posits that this was a CIA operation. It comes on the heels of an already white-hot controversy involving CIA operative Raymond Davis, who was working undercover in Pakistan when he shot and killed two Pakistanis who allegedly tried to rob him.

"The biggest mass criminal of the XXI?21st century? According to Wikipedia, 9-11 killed 3000. And there is no known direct involvement (yes inspiration) in any other attack. Surely if we are looking for people responsible for more than 5,000 deaths.

which, of course could only be true if bin Laden really existed, and if he did, he was a puppet of Dick Cheney who personally flew all 4 planes at the same time to not crash into the Pentagon and WTC because they were brought down by trained anacondas... and, and, and...

Everyone knows that Osama has been dead for several years in a hospital in Pakistan, Benazir Butto already talked about this in an interview with the BBC shortly before being murdered. Stories and more stories pure photoshop for the gallery, as well as the famous black birth certificate.

Set aside the usual European negro-fixation, cause the crazy train is steaming through:

Characters with apparent power and is more than doubtful intention, splattering everywhere in this desolate landscape: Berlusconi, Trump, despots of all sorts and power in many nations and key organizations of the productive system.

Without doubt we are in need of dramatic effects of the illusion weavers and motivation like Obama liquidating the hydra, and other comparable events that are leading the masses to awaken from its long slumber.

I’ll bet you didn’t even know that you were the mouth-breathing, easily led “masses”, because we have a fine example of a Euro-űbermensch who typically thinks he isn’t, but is sure that Donald Trump is the dictator of some state.

France "salutes the tenacity of the United States" after the death of bin Laden, a "major event in the global fight against terrorism," said President Nicolas Sarkozy in a statement. "The announcement by President Obama of the death of Osama bin Laden in the wake of a remarkable American commando operation in Pakistan, is a major event in the global fight against terrorism. France salutes the tenacity of the United States which had been searching for him for ten years," declares the Elysée Palace. "The main architect of the attacks of September 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden was the proponent of an ideology of hatred and the leader of a terrorist organization which has claimed thousands of victims worldwide, including in Muslim countries," adds the office of the president. France believes that "for these victims, justice is done." "This morning, the thoughts of France go to them and to their families," adds the Elysée. "The scourge of terrorism suffered a historic defeat, but this is not the end of al-Qaeda, " warns the palace. According to Paris, "the fight against criminals who claim it must be relentlessly pursued and band together all the states that are victims of these crimes."

Writing from Shanghai, Brice Pedroletti et Harold Thibault have a long report in Le Monde on China's first aircraft carrier. So far, the Ukrainian-built vessel's code name is only the F, but according to one report, the former Varyag has been renamed the Shi Lang — after a 17th-century admiral who… invaded Taiwan…